NO RAID was carried out on the home of Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) Commissioner General Khurshid Sattaur, nor was he disrespected, says GRA Chairman Rawle Lucas.Sattaur is currently on leave, and in a press conference held yesterday, Lucas cleared the air of a rumour that had been reported. “It is my understanding that at no time did the staff of GRA demonstrate any discourtesy or disrespect to Mr Sattaur. I believe…that Mr Sattaur was contacted by this office, and it was by mutual agreement that (he) himself offered the time when the GRA staff must come to collect the property. They did that under the advice that he gave them.

“At no time was there any kind of confrontational exchange between GRA staff and Mr Sattaur,” Lucas clarified.

The GRA Chairman said the organisation’s only intent, on visiting Sattaur’s home, was to retrieve and protect taxpayers’ data. “I want you to understand (that) the only thing that we were interested in receiving from the Commissioner General was whatever data or information he had that pertained to the work of GRA,” Lucas explained.

He adumbrated that the removal of GRA property from Sattaur’s home was not done unknowingly to Sattaur, as it was the Commissioner General who had personally provided the date and time officers should visit his home to retrieve the property.

PURTUBED
The Private Sector Commission (PSC) on Friday expressed concern over media reports on the search of Sattaur’s home by GRA officials.

“The Commission is both perturbed and concerned at this treatment of a very senior official who has not been formally accused of any wrongdoing. To the best of our knowledge, Mr Sattaur is on leave from the entity pending the results of an inquiry. He has not been asked to resign and as such remains both the de jure and de facto head of the GRA. In the circumstances, if his electronic communication devices were required for purposes of the investigation, then the proper procedure would have entailed a request to Mr Sattaur to hand these over to the Board.”

The PSC said that, based on its information, “the invasion” of the Commissioner General’s home was not conducted by the police armed with a search and seizure warrant. This is a violation of his human rights,” the Commission said in a statement to the media.

“It was reported that the officers who went to Mr Sattaur’s home were officers of the Guyana Revenue Authority, and we do not believe that they are/or were legally authorised to do so. This searching of homes of officials of entities under investigation seems to have become common practice, and we call upon President Granger to rein in what appears, from all accounts in the public domain, to be a show of excessive enthusiasm on the part of some persons,” the PSC statement said.

But Lucas maintained that Sattaur was not disrespected in any way by the GRA officials who visited his home.

TAX PAYERS’ INFORMATION
Lucas said that under the new Board, which became operational June last year, priority is being given to the protection of taxpayers’ data. He said all information pertinent to tax payers will be treated with strict confidentiality.

Sattaur proceeded on 200 days’ leave on December 17 last on the directive of the GRA Board. While noting that the Commissioner General can retain possession of certain properties of the GRA while on leave, the GRA Board Chairman said all information that belongs to the GRA was removed and “retained in the official repository of the organisation”.

While in the process of collecting all data from Sattaur, the authority requested that Sattaur assist in identifying other persons who may have been or were in possession of property belonging to GRA that was not under the control of the Authority. “We did not receive a reply from the Commissioner General,” said Lucas.

GULF CART
“As a result of (this), when we enquired of the Commissioner General (about) what other property he might have had for the GRA, it was learnt that he had six vehicles…one of which included a golf cart,” Lucas added.

Management of GRA was by The Board of Directors informed that Sattaur should be left with one vehicle of his choice, but Commissioner General (ag) Ingrid Griffith “was considerate in leaving the golf cart with him”.

“So he has at least two vehicles that are property of the GRA. We were not interested in anything else but the tax payers’ data. That’s all we were interested in,” said the Chairman of GRA the board.

Lucas disclosed that GRA Information Technology Division personnel were asked to go to Sattaur’s house to retrieve data following an agreement. However, when the team arrived, they were told that the exercise couldn’t be done.

We intended to ensure we kept that data in a separate folder,(one) identifiable by the source from which it was gotten, to make sure that we were not co-mingling any information which the Commissioner General had collected while serving actively in the position with anything that was taking place after his departure on vacation. That was our sole interest,” he said.

He added: “We wanted to ensure that the assets and resources of the organization and government were properly protected. We wanted to ensure that tax payer’s data were properly protected. That’s all we were interested in”

Asked specifically about an existing policy that permits the Commissioner General to have access to GRA’s servers at his home, Lucas said, “I am not aware of any policy within the organisation that suggests that that is normal practice. I cannot say so.”

However, Griffith sought to explain the organisation’s policy on ‘access to linkage by certain officials of GRA’. “The policy of the GRA is, if you are on leave or extensive leave, certain access would not be granted to you, especially the access of linkage…”

She said the policy did exist previously, but “it has been taken away”.

Sattaur was sent on leave by the Board to facilitate a comprehensive audit of the organisation.

By Ariana Gordon